Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

I’m Lieutenant Deviled Yeggs.  I work homicide in the big city of Tracy.  Working for me are my old partners: Detective Sgt. Jim Wednesday and Detective Poached Yeggs, my nephew who is slowly becoming a good detective.  But then again, I have all the detectives in the big city of Tracy reporting to me.  Even so, I HELP them when they need help, but I WORK homicide.

Glyce, Naomi to most folks these days, asked me to pick up the children at Lily the Pink.  Blaise was working late in the lab and Grannie Fannie promised to drop him off personally once he was finished.  Sophie wanted to come home early to work on a major school project that was not due for a while, but in our house, procrastination was not allowed.

I picked up Gigi and Sophie, and we went home.  Sophie ran to her room and closed the door so that she would not be disturbed.  I went to the den and exchanged my shoes for some slippers.  I usually sit and listen to some music to decompress, but Gigi wanted to talk.

She jumped into my lap, but in the process she planted her foot firmly in my groin.

“Oof,” I groaned.  Then I squeaked, “Gigi, we have talked about not touching each other where the swimsuit goes.”

Gigi giggled, “Daddy, you sound funny.  And I didn’t put my hands there.  I held onto your arms and climbed up.”

I squeaked, “And you planted your feet right on the naughty spot.”

Gigi said, “Does it hurt?  Ummm.  Daddy, you have tears in your eyes.  Are you sad?”

I squeaked, “No, Sweetie, I get personal time with you!  How can that make me sad?  How was your day?”

Gigi giggled, “You first, Daddy?  Did you put the cups on anybody today?”

I shook my head, “I have been over this before, Gigi.  Since I am the lieutenant, I rarely put hang cups on anybody.  The detectives do that.”

Gigi started giggling, “You said, ‘hang cups.’  Mommy is teaching me to say the word right.  It’s not hang cups.”

I asked, now with a few deep breaths, I was closer to my normal octave.  “How does Mommy want you to say those words?”

Gigi looked very seriously, and she concentrated. “Han duh Cup fiss. Mommy says I still need to work on it.”

I nodded.

She then asked, “If you didn’t use your cup fiss, did Poach duh?  Unka Jim?  Unka Nick?  And I can say Oncle Georges.”

I smiled, “No, they were mostly with me at the courthouse.”

Gigi asked, “Why were you there?”

I smiled, “The arrest, we put the cuffs on them is a small part.  We gather the evidence.  We present our case to the prosecutor.  They review everything, and we make the arrest if we do not already have them in custody.  Then they can be arraigned.  That is where bail is set or denied.  If they can make bail, they pay the bail and then they have to return when the court case is ready to go before a judge and jury.”

Gigi asked, “Like Samuel’s daddy?”

I smiled, “Yes, like Judge Farquharson, Samuel’s daddy.  Then, depending on what the prosecutor and the defense attorney want to do, the detective will be called into court to give evidence on what they saw, and how they drew the conclusion that we had arrested the right person.  Today, Poached was there for two cases. They both copped a plea deal.”

Gigi asked, “What’s that?”

I sighed, “These two guys were offered a lesser charge if they could tell us who supplied the drugs to the biker gang.  Both of them saw the jurors and before anyone asked any questions, they told their defense attorney that they would cooperate.  That meant Oncle Georges took them into an interview room and when he got the information that he needed, they were found guilty to a lesser crime.  They will be in prison for about a year before they will be eligible for parole.  But now Georges has an airtight case on two members of the Rotten Apple Gang.  Those two guys will be in prison a long time.  And Poached did not have to give any evidence.  But Beau Junko gave evidence on a Bunco case.”

Gigi asked, “What’s that?”

I smiled, “Bunco for the police is fraud, scams, and con games.  Tricking people out of the money.  Beau arrests people who tell lies to cheat people out of their money.  Beau had found a used car dealer who was creating two fake reports.  One fake report was like they advertise on TV, the Car Fox.  He had this official looking report saying that the car had never been in an accident.  The other report said that the car was not a lemon.  They were overcharging people a lot of money for a car that in some cases was not even safe to drive.”

Gigi asked, “But, Daddy, if Mr. Beau was answering their questions, why were you there?”

I smiled, “I am his boss.  The prosecutor said that I should be there if a procedural question came up.  I could be cross examined about the procedure and then, they could compare that with how Detective Junko, not Mr. Beau, presented the evidence.”

Gigi asked, “Did they ask you to talk?”

I shook my head, “It was straightforward.  The jury did not take very long to find the dealership guilty.”

Gigi asked, “Anything else?”

I nodded, “Jack Gripper had a knife fight to deal with.  That case was not complete today, but they called me to the stand and I was sworn in.”

Gigi asked, “Did you have to put your hand on the Bible?”

I smiled, “I did not have to.  I gladly did that.”  Gigi smiled. “I was there because the defense lawyer was arguing that the evidence was not handled properly.  I got up to explain the process.  Then, I showed the bag where the knife was placed was sealed properly.  There was evidence that the bag had not been tampered with.  There was a chain of evidence from the crime tech at the scene to the detective to the lab person.  Back into the envelope and into the evidence locker.  The knife had the victim’s blood on it and the blood of the man on trial.  They will have the defense witnesses tomorrow.  Only Detective Gripper has to go back.  The defense rarely calls me back since I ruined his idea about us being sloppy.  So I will be back in the precinct tomorrow.  Now how was your day?”

Gigi was about to say something when Glyce came into the room.  She had a tray with a cup of tea for her, and a hot chocolate for both Gigi and me.  I liked the dark chocolate and Gigi was on a raspberry kick lately.

Naomi asked, “How was your day, dear?”

Gigi interrupted, “Don’t ask, Mommy. It was boring stuff.”

Naomi nodded and chuckled, “How was the courthouse?”

Gigi gasped, “I just said ‘boring’ and you figured out he went to the coat house.”

Naomi said, “Courthouse, Gloria Grace.  And Daddy and I talk about our plans, and I knew this morning that he would be in court all day.  Now say. ‘Court House.’ ”

Gigi concentrated, “Cour tuh … House.”

Naomi smiled, “You are starting to get it.  So, how was your day, Gigi?”

Gigi took a sip of hot chocolate.  “Hot! We played a dice game.”

I moaned, “Am I going to have to send Detective Bones Rattler to the preschool?  He breaks up illegal dice games.  Did you play for money?”

Gigi giggled, “No, Daddy, we were learning shapes and colors.  One of the dice had colors.  The other dice had shapes.”

Naomi said, “If it is one of the dice, the singular is ‘die.’  One die. Two dice.”

Gigi giggled, “But that is what I am saying.  They weren’t the same.  One had colors and one had shapes.  And then Miss Madelaine had these things on the floor.  She would call us up and she would roll the dice.  When I came up, one dice.  Ummm.  One die had a star.  The other die had yellow.  The game was that I had to find the yellow star on the floor and stand on it.  And, Mommy, when I saw the dice, I had to say the words, and yellow is yellow.  When I said, ‘lellow,’ Miss Madelaine said I had to say it right.  She even makes Kanok say it right.  Kanok says lots of words funny, but Miss Madelaine makes all of us say it right.  Kanok is a year older, so she does really good in the class.  Ibie and Baffy do good too.  And they help us out when we get confused.  I got a green oval.  Mommy, did you know that an oval is like the shape of an egg?  I was looking around trying to think of what it looked like and Ibie pointed and said where it was.”

I said, “Wasn’t that cheating?  Or were you on the same team?”

Naomi laughed, “Dev, part of preschool is teaching them how to follow directions.  Part of the curriculum is how to share and cooperate with other people.  That is very helpful for children that are an only child and spend most of their day with Mommy.  So, the game they played today may have a new rule the next time that they play.  At some point, Miss Madelaine may tell the others to not help, to test the child’s ability to work out the problem on their own.  But now, since the preschool is about two months old, she is building up teamwork within the class.”

Gigi was getting excited, “Yeah!  Yeah!  And next time, all the colors won’t be in the same row.  And the shapes will be mixed up.  And we will have new shapes!  Today we had circles and squares and stars and ovals and triangles and hearts.  Miss Madelaine says we will have some different shapes and the words are harder to say.”

I asked, “Like a rectangle or a trapezoid.”

Glyce purred, “Or a parallelogram.”

Gigi nodded, “Yeah!  Yeah!  Can you come to class and say that one for me?”

I hugged her, “No, Gigi, you are on your own, but I think Miss Madelaine knows you are one of the youngest in the class.”

Gigi said, “I am not the youngest, Daddy.  Frank, Lympie, and Catalina are all younger.”

I asked, “I knew Frank Lynn and Olympia Allott were in the class, but I thought Catalina was too young.”

Glyce said, “She is only one month too young.  The school that Madelaine Morrissey has developed is K-3.  And if Catalina stays up with everyone else, when she goes off to the fourth grade, they won’t be worried about that month.  I think GrandPa wants to see them all in school.”  I nodded, knowingly.  GrandPa was slowing down and getting weaker.  After all, he was 98 years old, and he had been really sick with that fungal lung issue.  He got his spark back but not his stamina.

Glyce called Sophie on the phone.  Glyce wanted Sophie to take Gigi out for a meal.  Then Glyce said, “I think the basic outline and some of the needed resources is a good start.  Daddy had a tough day at the courthouse and he needs to decompress.”

Sophia came into the room, laughing, “Decompress.  That’s a good one, Mom, I know what you two are going to be doing.  Now, twenty dollars please.  No make it thirty dollars.  There are two of us.”

Gigi hopped off my lap and ran toward Sophie.  Glyce saw the pain in my eyes.

Glyce said, “Dev, have Gigi stand by your side, facing away from you.  Lift her onto your lap.  Easy, Peasie, and no kicks in the groin along the way.”  I nodded, and Sophia nearly doubled over with laughter.

Sophie and Gigi went into the hallway, but we could still hear them.

Sophie said, “How about a ‘Smile Awhile’ at Murphy burgers?”

Gigi squealed, “Yeah! Yeah! And I want nuggie-wuggies with two barbeque sauces and an extra cookie.”

Sophie said, “Hmmm.  That changes where we are going.  You have to sit in the backseat regardless, but do you remember the routine?”

Gigi said, “Yeah!  When you make the order, I say, ‘Driver, remember the two sauces and an extra cookie.’”

Sophie said, “And you know how Mom always talks about a double malted milk?”

Gigi asked, “Yeah.  What is that?”

Sophie said, “We are going to go to Standish Pharmacy to the Soda Fountain counter. and you and I will each have one.”

Gigi said, “Goodie!  We need to do this more often!”

With that, they were gone.  Maybe since Standish Pharmacy is a block away from Lily the Pink, Sophie will drag Blaise out of the lab to save Grannie Fannie having to drive him home.

Glyce asked, “Is Sophie teaching her younger sister how to con a Murphy burger out of a cookie?”

I shrugged, “Sophie is learning the tricks of being a cop.  An extra cookie today, an entire sack of donuts once she’s in uniform.”

Glyce asked, “Did Gigi kick you hard?”

I said, “It’s still a little sensitive.”

Glyce asked, “Do you want me to rub it?”

I laughed, “I was wondering why you got rid of the two girls.  I would love you to … ummm.  … rub it.”

Glyce fanned herself, “You smooth talker.  Let’s go before you change your mind.”

I shrugged, “I change my mind about a lot of things, but that is not one of them.”

“And, Big Boy,” Glyce purred, “I might just be a naughty girl.  You wouldn’t happen to have any hang cups on you?  Now, would you?”

I questioned, “I thought they were han duh cup fiss?”

Glyce put her arms around my neck, nibbled on my ear, and then suggested, “Are you going to pronounce them or use them?”

Credits

In an old Alan Sherman song, he has a line about “I will drop all my sorrow in a double-malted milk” meaning that he will be off his diet.

And if you have not guessed, I have used Murphy Burgers several times.  The Irish name “Murphy” is translated as “Sea Warrior.”  So, making them a burger joint sounded a bit incongruous.  And mentioning “Smile Awhile” and nuggie-wuggies should not infringe on any trademarks.